Meet a Specialist: Matthew Gardiner, M.D.

Like the parent of a teenager, Dr. Gardiner hears the telephone ring all day long. But these calls aren’t personal calls. Dr. Gardiner is the Director of the Emergency Room and the Director of Ophthalmology Emergency Services at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary. “We get phone calls from ER physicians at other hospitals all over New England who don’t have access to ophthalmologists,” he says.

“May we send this patient to you?” is a question Dr. Gardiner hears frequently from physicians at other hospitals. The question is a testament to the quality of care and level of specialization at Mass. Eye and Ear, the only hospital in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts that is dedicated to treating eye injuries.

“Mass. Eye and Ear is a great place to work because I have access to so many wonderfully talented people. If I need a subspecialty consultation, all I have to do is call one of my colleagues here,” says Dr. Gardiner.

In addition to caring for patients and supervising residents and fellows in the Emergency Room, Dr. Gardiner is also an attending physician in Mass. Eye and Ear’s Comprehensive Ophthalmology department. Receiving more than 15,000 patient visits per year, primary care ophthalmologists for this general eye service provide comprehensive eye care, including annual eye exams and management of a variety of eye conditions, such as cataracts and age-related macular degeneration.

Though Dr. Gardiner enjoys his position because it offers him the variety of providing primary care and managing eye emergencies, he emphasizes that it is always important to educate people about preventing eye trauma. “Something as simple as wearing your seatbelt when you drive or wearing safety glasses when you are mowing the lawn could prevent a significant eye injury,” he says.

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Dr. Song remembers quite clearly the day he decided to become an ophthalmologist. He was a medical student at the New York University School of Medicine, completing his ophthalmology rotation, when he witnessed the life-changing impact that a corneal transplant had for a patient with severe keratoconus.

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